A recent press release from ETS, the company responsible for producing the GRE, indicates that in the last two months more than 100 business schools world-wide signed up to begin accepting the GRE. This activity brings the total number of business schools accepting the GRE above 600, including 60 of the top 100 schools on the latest US News & World Report ranking. The question becomes, what exactly does this mean for people considering business school?

In this edition of our ongoing study tips, we introduce you to the testing effect, another handy (and scientifically proven, read about a study here) method for improving your study habits and information retention.

Higher Education has long been seen as one of the crown jewels in the American Dream. Go to school, earn more money, have a better life. For several decades this paradigm has held true. These days the picture is a little more like watching Standard Definition TV in our HD/3-D world: it’s just not good enough.

Recently, renewed inspection — and criticism — of the higher education landscape has taken a number of forms. We’ll look at some of the criticism being leveled, but, more importantly, take a look at a couple key things you should know to help you avoid some of the downsides currently plaguing higher education.

In our earlier review, Ajani gave his impressions of the program using it on an iPhone 3G. This review will be done on a sweet 1 month old iPad version 2. I’m only a minor technophile so I don’t know all the iPad’s specs except it’s got the most memory of all the models. I also have to thank Joanna Graham and the lovely people at GMAC for “the hook-up” on the app.

First Impressions: In keeping with many iPad apps it’s a great looking program with limited advantages over existing products.

We (we, the world, not we Bell Curves – which is singular anyway but that’s another story) know more now than ever before about the workings of the human mind and memory, thanks to the field of cognitive neuroscience. What does this mean for you, you ask? These advances have very practical applications, especially for students who wish to improve the efficiency of their studying.

So GMAC’s new Official GMAT App has finally arrived. We were excited to check it out and provide a product review for people considering a purchase. Before we get into the review, let’s take a look at some information on the app:

Many hard GMAT quantitative questions present problems because of the exceedingly time-consuming calculations needed to solve, or because the way to solve the problem isn’t easily apparent. One solution to these kinds of problems can often be found by identifying and using patterns. Here’s some helpful information to help you utilize the presence of patterns to improve your accuracy and efficiency (which is what you should seek rather than speed) on GMAT Quant:

Vocabulary is one of the most essential tools for college students, prospective college students, and graduates. You’ll need vocabulary words for the SAT or GRE, for your reading assignments, and to make a good impression upon those you speak to. And, while you do need to increase your vocabulary, sometimes it’s just too much of a bother to walk away from the computer or couch and grab a dictionary. Well, if you want an easy way to increase your lexicon while you’re surfing the web, try this add-on:

With the GRE changing on August 1st, 2011, and an increasing number of business schools accepting the GRE for the application process, we thought it might be a good time to discuss the two to help people make a decision about which test to take.

There are a number of factors that should influence your decision about which test to take. Before we get into those, we’d recommend that your first order of business should always be to contact the admissions office(s) at the program(s) you’re interested in to gather information on how each test is weighted in the admissions process. At present, very little information is given about how the two tests stack up in the admissions process (for example, Columbia provides a link to the GRE Comparison Tool on their admissions website, while Darden at the University of Virginia simply says the GRE is accepted in lieu of the GMAT; neither school, it should be noted, gives any specific info on how the tests are weighted). Given this circumstance, any information you can gather from the programs you’re interested in would be beneficial in informing your decision on which test to take.

Statistics questions can be some of the most exasperating Quant questions on the GMAT. And among those, Combination and Permutation questions may just be some of the worst. The good news: statistics questions are some of the least frequently tested concepts on GMAT Quant. The bad news: you’re still likely to see at least 1 Comb-Perm question come test day. Because higher scorers will likely see a difficult Comb-Perm question, strategies to tackle them are needed. That being said, don’t let those tricky Comb-Perm questions make you want pull your hair out. Often times, there’s an easier way to smooth over those Comb-Perm cowlicks (sorry, I’ll try to reign in the hair jokes).